In the United States, voting in Presidential elections is strongly divided along
regional lines.The Northeast and
the West Coast form the strength of the Democratic Partyís support in
presidential elections while the South and Mountain West are the base of support
for the Republican Party.The
Midwestern states once leaned Democratic but may be undergoing an electoral
realignment.The existence of these regional divides can be attributed to
characteristics of the electorate in each region.Black and other minority voters vote overwhelmingly
Democratic, as do Jews, those who do not practice their religion, members and
relatives of members of labor unions, those with low education and income
levels, those with advanced degrees, and those who live in urban areas.Republican supporters are likely to be white, strong
adherents to a Christian faith denomination, not members of labor unions,
college educated with higher incomes, and to live in rural areas.Populations that exhibit Republican voting characteristics
are found in the South and Mountain West, while populations with Democratic
voting characteristics were found to exist in the Northeast and Mountain West.The Midwest population contained characteristics that did not favor
either party.These regional divides in U.S. presidential elections affect
where the parties choose their candidates from as well as where the candidates
will spend their time campaigning prior to the election.

An interesting phenomenon that surfaced is that
regions with the highest median household incomes voted the most heavily
Democratic while the regions with the lowest median household incomes voted the
most Republican.This falls in
sharp contrast to the data that shows that the lower the family income the more
likely a person is to vote Democratic and the higher the family income the more
likely a person is to vote Republican.More
research needs to be done to effectively explain this phenomenon.

This study does
not take into account statistics in the voter characteristics from other years,
which may show differences and lead to different conclusions.It also only focuses on the factors of race, religion, education, income,
labor union membership, and urbanization as determinants of voting behavior,
ignoring other possible voter characteristics that may influence a personís
vote.Finally, this study pays
little attention to the rapidly increasing percentage of the population that is
not white, black, or Hispanic.As
these groups continue to grow their effect on the vote will as well.